[2014-04-15] Engadget: Why Amazon is right to steer clear of Bitcoin

[runam0k]

http://www.engadget.com/2014/04/15/amazon-bitcoin-currency/

Really disappointed in this one.  Big Engadget fan but so much misinformation in this article.

[CoinMode]

I just lost a bit of the small amount of respect I still had for them.

[Bit_Happy]

Sometime in the future, Engadget will probably write another article about BTC.
It will be fun to see what they say then.

[bryant.coleman]

Really disappointed in this one.  Big Engadget fan but so much misinformation in this article.

What is wrong in saying this?

Not only is Bitcoin a deeply unstable proposition, despite its growing fame, but it's also becoming clear that Amazon already has e-currency and payment-platform ambitions of its own.

[runam0k]

Really disappointed in this one.  Big Engadget fan but so much misinformation in this article.

What is wrong in saying this?

Not only is Bitcoin a deeply unstable proposition, despite its growing fame, but it's also becoming clear that Amazon already has e-currency and payment-platform ambitions of its own.

Nothing wrong with that statement and on a second read, the article isn't quite as bad as I first thought.  That said, there is no excuse for inaccuracies in the article and the obvious effort to avoid mentioning anything positive about Bitcoin.  No mention of Tiger Direct or Overstock accepting Bitcoin.  No quote from the CEO of Overstock that Amazon will one day be forced to accept Bitcoin (could not be more relevant to the article).  No questioning Amazon's claim that it is focusing on fiat exchange rate issues whilst completely ignoring a global currency like Bitcoin.  Instead we get:

Bitcoin's reputation as a safe place to hold your money is gossamer-thin. Any large corporation would leave itself open to a huge amount of risk if it began to accept transactions that aren't approved by trusted servers, but instead by "the community at large." Even the most daring of businesses are likely to balk at the idea that the general public, or at least a small subset of it, should have any influence on how it does its banking.

Imagine purchasing an item on Monday, but by the time the transaction cleared on Tuesday, the value of the payment had halved. Who do you think would pick up the bill for the lost cash?

And this recent correction to the article:

Correction: This article originally stated that Senator Manchin was still seeking to ban Bitcoin. He has since taken a less stridently anti-Bitcoin stance.

Though probably not surprising given the title of the article: "Why Amazon is right to steer clear of Bitcoin"

[omahapoker]

give it time. as soon as ebay, walmart, and google starts using it. amazon will

[fryarminer]

Bad article. Yes. But one line popped:

Much of that animosity stems from the fact that they won't provide Amazon with the purchasing information that it thrives upon.

Amazon wouldn't be half the superpower that it is if it didn't stalk your purchase history. That's pretty much what they use for their infrastructure. Maybe they find a hard way to do that with bitcoin, and that's the real reason behind not wanting it.

[HeliKopterBen]

Between February and March of this year, the better part of $500 million worth of Bitcoin was stolen from the Mt. Gox and Flexcoin exchanges. The currency may have been based on the notion that, so long as more than 50 percent of all users were behaving legitimately, then the system was tremendously secure. Now, however, Bitcoin's reputation as a safe place to hold your money is gossamer-thin. 

First of all, the author obviously doesn't understand that the exchanges have nothing to do with a 51% attack.

Secondly, the failure of mt gox and other exchanges proves the superiority and resiliency of the protocol.  There were no bailouts or quantitative easing.  These are problems that bitcoin was designed to solve and the system worked as intended by preventing bailouts to occur.